“I was watching The Wire on DVD one day after work. There is a scene in the second season where a young character named Bodie is in a gift shop looking for flowers for a friend’s funeral. He is unsatisfied with the popular and traditionally arranged flowers. A store employee ends up bringing Bodie to the back of the store and shows him the most unique arrangements. There were flowers in the shape of a cell phone, another in the shape of a car emblem and another as an RIP sign. Bodie is ecstatic that these flowers were more in line in representing him and his street life. Bodie orders an arrangement with ‘strong colors’ that must look like the towers where he and his friend used to hang out. The writer in me thought, ‘Hmm…well, he’s going to need a unique a greeting card to go with those flowers, too.’”
True to its inspiration, in additional to more traditional themes, Punch Street’s product offerings include cards aimed at teen parents, inmates in the prison system and patients just getting out of rehab – all reflecting raw realities of urban Millennial life that might make a Hallmark executive blanch. Greeting cards are a $7- 8B/year business and despite the image of white-haired grandmas sending out Christmas cards with crisp twenties tucked inside, it’s actually the 24- 35 year-old demographic that spends the most on cards, dropping over 41% more cash than Gen Xers. Punch Street is hoping to grab a piece of this pie, but DePaz knows that while Millennials might be a lucrative target market, they’re also a high maintenance and mercurial one.
“The idea screams risk, but I have purpose. I want to embrace today’s culture using a vibrant platform. I create cards that reflect young adults and teens in a way that is missing yet very much needed in the greeting card market today. Also, I believe that to truly make a meaningful connection, we need for it to be printed cards. Millennials, in particular, are using email, text messages and engaging in so many other wireless connections. With Punch Street, we act as a bridge to allow our customers to still use technology in the way that we are familiar with, yet send real products focused on us to help make real connections,” she says.
DePaz hopes Punch Street’s business model, which attempts to marry the convenience of e-cards with the thoughtfulness of traditional print cards, will do just that. Customers choose their card design, personalize it with a message or their own images and then outsource the printing, addressing, stamping and mailing to the Punch Street team. Senders get all the karma that comes from the effort of providing a hard-copy message of support, commiseration or congratulations, but don’t have to brave the post office to do so and can remain firmly ensconced in the Millennial socio-cultural bubble that presumes letter mail to be an incredibly confusing phenomenon that should have died out with the Pony Express (Wikipedia that, kids).
DePaz is frank about the fact that she has a lot riding on the success of Punch Street. In addition to leaving her law job, she gave up an apartment overlooking the Hudson and sank all of her saving into launching the startup. Despite the fact that success is far from guaranteed, especially when it comes to banking on young Americans both having disposable income and being willing to spend it on her product, she doesn’t regret the decision to embrace entrepreneurship.
“There are nights when I can’t sleep because I’m bursting with ideas on design or strategy. I even keep a notepad and pen by my bed stand now for those last minute ideas I have. It’s a feeling of genuine passion in what I’m doing. Although I didn’t realize it at the time, because I was a very hard working attorney, I wasn’t stretching when I was working at the law firm. I wasn’t reaching. I was just doing. Only now do I feel as if I’m flying.”
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Credit : Forbes
